Fifty-five year old Jack Griffin has been in a funk for a very long time. The only child of dysfunctional and embittered college professors, he proudly asserts that he aggressively rejected his mother and father’s warped values, their snobbery, their refusal to compromise, and their chronic dissatisfaction. In Richard Russo’s bittersweet THAT OLD CAPE MAGIC, Griffin discovers, much to his chagrin, that he has inherited his parents’ negativity and selfishness.